 werewolf comic, prohibition era, and booze. Sounds like a good time. Hi everybody, welcome to another exciting episode, another edition of We Can Get Them Here on YouTube. My name is Devon Menendez, and today we're gonna be talking about Brian Etzarello's and Eduardo Rizzo's Moonshine Volume 1. It is a very interesting book, and in case you're wondering, this isn't the regular cover, this is the DCBS variant which I got off of a famous website. So what is Moonshine about? This gangster, this low level I guess I should say, or this city slick gangster from New York, Lou Pirlo, he is moving to the Appalachians at the request of his gangster boss to get a very specific brand of Moonshine. This is in the midst of prohibition, Great Depression, and of course the upcoming Second World War. So it is a very interesting taboo time in regards to what people were consuming, what they were indulging in, I guess I should say, in the history of the US. This is no exception, it touches on the issues of the time. You deal a little bit with racism, with the contraband market, with prohibition of course, plus it's a horror comic book with the central theme of werewolves. Now, I am a huge fan of movie monsters, that is my type of horror I guess. I'm not too into the whole slasher scene, the paranormal stuff. I do like the subject matter, I like reading about it in real life, but not necessarily watching a movie about it. I don't know, I prefer a more sci-fi approach. Your aliens, monsters, freaking universal monsters and all that stuff. And one of the things I like, very specifically, are werewolves. I love the mythology behind it and the stories and just the movies and books and all that stuff. So I was really excited when I think somebody online recommended the book to me. I don't know where I got the idea to get it, but somebody recommended the book to me and I gotta say I had to read this book. This was supposed to come out a while ago, but I waited until Halloween, you know, the whole Spooktober thing that you guys like and to at least try and put a Halloween themed video on this channel. But I had to read it three times, actually two times, because I was a little bit conflicted by it. At first, I gotta be honest with you. I was a little bit lost and it had to do with the fact that the way the art works in this book with Rizzo's art, it's beautiful. Don't get me wrong. This high quality contrast of lights and shadows and using colored backgrounds to indicate the mood that the reader is going to experience, it is very indicative of a smart and beautifully crafted comic book. Do not get me wrong. However, some of the faces are pretty similar to the point where there's a gangster battle near the end of this book. And I was like, wait, this guy is that other guy? So I had to go back and like, oh, okay, this guy, like there's two Tonys involved. And there's another guy called Ducky because I guess he has a duck-like face. And you sort of get lost because they all look grungy and off the time, you know, they're not clean cut. The only and even our main protagonist, sure, he's got that swagger on, but nobody's clean in this book. Everybody's hiding something. There is an ulterior motive. There is vengeance. There is blood. They're swearing. There is sex. There is a lot of things involved in this story. Now, the character of Lou travels to the Appalachian Mountains. Of course, like I said at the beginning of the video, and when he gets here, when he gets there, I should say, not here, I don't live there. When he gets there, he is looking for the Holt dude that is making the booze that this New York gangster wants to export or sell through, you know, darker means with the high class because it is a quality moonshine product that people will want to buy and continue drinking. At first Holt is skeptical and they don't really get off to a great start. The character of Lou, he is one of these guys that is more of a messenger. He's not really a doer. He is the type that will deliver that message, but won't actually go along with the plan. There will always be somebody that does that specifically. So this is a chance for this character to do that for the very first time. So he's very nervous about it. He goes to meet with Holt and it's a very fun scene that I really enjoyed when he's trying to explain what, who and where and all that stuff with these characters and it's a rocky start and eventually there's the trail, there is a little bit of a romance, there's a huge ton of mysticism involved and that is one of the things that I really enjoyed and I kind of want it more out of it. I know the story is not complete because there's more, it's a ongoing series, but the story does, you know, if there weren't any other issues it kind of sort of concludes in a cliffhangery way, but I could see it not going forward. Like it's fine the way it ends. I don't necessarily enjoy the way it ends, but it's okay. I don't know if you guys are getting me, but the whole thing with Moonshine is this exploration of a rich cultural background that rarely gets explored. The Appalachian Mountains are filled with a lot of amazing folklore and some weird shit, pardon my expression, the fact that they're able to mix in like American werewolves and all that stuff, it's actually pretty frickin great. The illustrations, like I mentioned at the beginning of the video, are superb. Rizzo and Azarello make a dynamic duo, a tour de force if you will. Azarello has the lingo down, the way everybody's talking with the accents and all that stuff and just the way rural America went about its business back in the day. It's very crisp and genuine in my opinion and I think Brian does a really good job. With the art, however, it's a tour de force. Like I mentioned at the beginning that contrast and if it's a scene with the mop boss, the background is blue and if it's in the middle of town it's a very dingy looking town. You see a lot of earthy yellowish colors and all that stuff. If it's in the mountains of course at night there's a lot of playing with lights and shadows. It's a superb artistic book that I really really recommend. If you want to read a good horror story that you know it's not necessarily a hundred percent about the spook because you I'll be honest with you it could have been scarier or you could have shown a little bit more but it's just enough to intrigue you and hopefully with the I think volume 2 comes out in a couple months as of this video or next month I'm not too sure. I hope that we do get more horror elements because there is something there to be explored out of this rich cultural background especially with I believe her name was Dahlia. She is a black woman that is she's sort of like this Shaman-esque character and she's involved with I think Voodooish practices or something. She's able to link Lu with his personal demons and what he's going through physically with the Holt family and all that stuff. I don't want to give everything away but I do want to intrigue you. Now the horror element if that is what you're after it's actually really freaking great like the scenes where you see the werewolves are really frightening and spooky and I loved it I wish there was just a little bit more. This is a mob crime thriller from the 20s I believe this is in 1929 mixed with a horror fantasy element that I wish could be explored a little bit longer. Again I don't know what happens beyond the first six issues in this trade but it looks a superb and I don't know at first and I believe I wrote to my friends at first I wasn't too sure what to think of the book but I kept thinking all day before recording this now about the book and about what I read and I actually really friggin enjoyed it and I went back in and to look at the art and get a few more details before I started talking with you guys and I really enjoyed it I really loved this like scenes like this I don't know if the camera is focusing or not it looks it looks really impressive and just the layouts and the usage of a confined space to give you that paranoia and fear that you're running away from something whether it be supernatural in nature a monster or another fellow human being that's shooting at you something like that it gives off this sense of like like you're reading something that happened back in the day you know look at this this is a very somber angry scene so of course we use the color yellow you know to express emotions beautifully same with this you know the twilight hours approaching so you gotta down the colors a bit and it just keeps going on and on in a beautiful way see what I meant with the uses of shadows and there's a little wolf action right there there's not a lot of extras just variants yeah just literally just two pages of the images they used for the variant covers and all that stuff I gotta say this book is pretty freaking awesome I was a little bit skeptical but it's it's pretty interesting I wish like I mentioned earlier I wish we could have a little bit more horror thrown in but at the end but at the end of the day you know like I mentioned it's it's more of a crime drama and of course if you're talking werewolves there is sort of the curse of the werewolf and what the character that is cursed has to deal with and faced repercussions and we see characters reflecting on things that have happened to them and how they progress forward and facing their fears while at the same time experiencing fear I don't know what did you guys think of moonshine have you read it let me know down below if not let me know which is your favorite or what is your favorite horror book to read in October I'm very interested in finding out so yeah anyways thank you guys thank you for making this happen this channel is because of you guys I love entertaining you and if you would be so kind you can like comment subscribe follow me on your favorite social media platform Facebook Twitter all that stuff guys thank you so much I will catch all of you on our next episode